The Princess and the Dragon
by Myrina1896
Summary: Fairy Tail AU. A Princess runs away from home and unexpectedly finds a friend.


**Originally** **written for a school assignment where I had to write my own fairy tale. So a fairy tale about fairy tail. Heh. Don't own anything.**

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Once upon a time a lonely princess lived in a large castle on an even larger piece of land, surrounded by all types of trees and flowers. Few lived in this castle, however, as the king's wife had died unexpectedly 10 years ago and in his grief, fired all of the house staff expect for a close few and never let any guests stay at his home. In those ten years, the princess grew into a beautiful woman who was sought out for by many. But the king turned all of them away.

Years of solitude and being ignored by her father had made the princess crave for affection and attention. So she left. In the middle of the night, the princess ran away from the only home she knew with a bag of food, an extra set of servant clothes, a water skin on her side, and wearing work clothes for a man with a map of kingdom in one hand. No money or fancy clothes. All of that belonged to her father and the world she no longer wanted to be a part of.

Six months later, the princess finally relaxed and looked at what her life had become. In the furthest village away from the castle, the princess made a deal with the local wizard to train under him for magic and fighting skills as long as she worked at his shop. There was little pay but he treated her kindly and gave her food more often than not. The former princess had finally been able to tell someone new her name. Lucy.

A year after she ran away from home, the peace in the small village was disrupted. The forest was sick and dying and the people who lived close to the village started growing red scales on their skin. It panicked the whole village and many had come to the only wizard in the village to help, which happened to be Lucy's teacher. However, teacher was old and couldn't help, no matter how much he wanted to. He sent Lucy out into the woods instead with a sack of food, a book of anything and everything magic, and a pair of knives for anyone or anything she may encounter.

The forest was dark and dying. No sunlight touched the ground and Lucy was sweating bullets due to the unusual heat. It wasn't long until Lucy heard loud yelling and cursing further in the forest. She griped her knife tighter and ventured further into the dark, dying forest, internally wishing she had brought more water.

Finally, she made it to the source of the noise and she had almost screamed out of fear. Shifting constantly between a human form and a scalier one, the fire overgrown lizard cursed in several languages and roaring every other word, which was clearly the source of the major heat wave. Seven large white crystals were laid in a large circle around the clearly in pain dragon, all of them humming with great magical power. Her mind immediately went to work on the lacrima and didn't pay attention to the suffering dragon until she felt a puff of air on her neck as she kneeled next to a crystal and froze when a raspy voice spoke near her ear.

"What are you doing, little mage?" The fire dragon was in a weird mix of his two forms, his body twitching as he struggled to concentrate on Lucy. She reacted like any human would react. She rambled.

"Well, with all the magic you are putting out with the constant change between human and dragon, the forest is dying with the extreme heat and the rivers are drying up. Even the villagers are growing scales because of all your magic. My teacher, Makarov, well Gramps, couldn't come out here in the forest because he is too old so he sent me because he taught me everything he knows. I was really scared because of the heat that's coming off of you and duh, you're a dragon. But what I want to know is how you got trapped here in the first place because these lacrima are huge and filled with magic energy. How could you, a dragon, miss it? The magic in these lacrima is really interesting though because it seems like it was made for a fire dragon just your size. So, I have a question, Mr. Fire Dragon. How did you get trapped here?" The dragon didn't know how to react and blinked, as if he was thinking over her words. After a minute of staring at each other, the dragon sat down, crossing his legs with a wince and still twitching to keep his form under control.

"I was just looking for a tasty snack when a ice wizard called Grey taunted me over here and set down the seventh lacrima when I was in place. His magic interferes with mine so I'm constantly shifting between forms and hurts really bad. So, if you could please free me and I'll be forever in your debt. Dragon's honor and all that. My name is Natsu, by the way." Lucy thought for a minute, looked at the dragon, and nodded and replied with her own name.

It took hours, but the dragon was free just as the sun set and the two talked for the rest of the night with Lucy kept warm by Natsu's roaring fire. By morning, they were best friends.

For the rest of Lucy's life, she explored the kingdom looking for adventure but always coming back to the small village she called home. Every time she left, one could see a robed figure walking next to her and on rare occupations, see a scaled red tail pecking out from under the cloak. No one from the castle ever found her and the kingdom soon fell to the hands of its people when its king died seven years after the princess mystically disappeared. No one has yet to find the princess who had the sun-kissed hair. Yet, every year on the anniversary of the princess' disappearance, some claim that they saw a fire dragon soaring above the empty castle, a female-looking figure riding on his back and her long blond hair flying behind her.


End file.
